4th Grade Garden Learning

In fourth grade, students explore the connection between food and culture.  Each student will interview an elder in their family or community to learn about their special foods and food traditions.  Students will use the learning from these interviews to select crops for the school gardens that reflect the richness and diversity of our school communities. 

Lesson 1: Gardens, Food, Family, and Culture

• In this lesson, students will select a food item from the garden and discuss how that ingredient / item is used or eaten in their food experiences and how it is connected to the garden (what plant part, where does it come from, etc).  Students will discuss what foods and food traditions are important to them and to their families/communities.  Students will assess their current knowledge of their own family food traditions.  

Lesson 2: Elder Food Interview Prep

• Students will read a segment of “Bring Me Some Apples And I’ll Make You a Pie: A Story About Edna Lewis” by Robin Gourley.  Students will keep track of and report on the various food traditions, recipes, and family members they heard and saw in the story.  Students will brainstorm a list of questions that they would ask an elder if they were to write a story about that person’s food traditions and memories.  Students will use these questions to conduct an interview with an elder in their family or community.

Lesson 3: Elder Food Interview Share-Out

• Students will share about their experience of interviewing an elder in their family / community.  Students will share from where these foods and recipes originated and any information they gathered about the food culture of the person they interviewed.  Students will discuss similarities and differences in food cultures.  Students will identify at least one recipe or ingredient featured prominently in their interview about which they will conduct further research in order to determine whether it is something that can be grown in our local climate / school garden.

• Social Studies Grade 4: Topic 4: 4. Explain that many different groups of people immigrated to the United States from other places voluntarily and some were brought to the United States against their will (as in the case of people of Africa). 

Lesson 4: Crop Planning

• Students will develop a spring crop plan for the school garden based on the plant research they have completed and select which crops/foods should be grown in the school gardens that reflect the foodways of their families, cultures, and communities.

Lesson 5: Spring Planting

• Students will plant their chosen crops in the school garden and study and sketch the primary structures of these plants.

• 4-LS1-1. Construct an argument that animals and plants have internal and external structures that support their survival, growth, behavior, and reproduction. 

JCA Field Trip (occasional offering through the JCA, not currently active)

• In collaboration with the Garden Program, students visit the Jewish Center of Amherst, tour the synagogue, meet with the Rabbi, and work with the JCA head baker to prepare and eat a baked good rooted in Jewish food traditions.

Fourth grade classes also have the opportunity to explore special foods and foodways through a collaboration with each school's art teacher and the Mead Art Museum at Amherst College. Students spend time discussing works of art from the Mead's collection and create their own food-related art. You can view students' artwork and read excerpts from their elder interviews in these beautiful books, designed by project collaborator Olivia Feal, Museum Educator at the Mead. Students each receive a copy of the book as well, and a copy becomes part of the community archive at the Jones Library.